The World's Most Expensive Insect Repellent

The World's Most Expensive Insect Repellent

Hordes desire thy blood, crave, crave, lest it devour thy entirely.

Sadly we’re talking ‘bout mosquitoes. And there’s nothing special about getting on their invitation list. If you’ve ever been feasted upon more than the buffet during one of your many outdoor parties you know the feeling of being passed on as they chow down your arms like corn on the cob. You scratch so much it starts to look like you’re carrying the plague. One can endure the pain but the itch? I’d rather blade that down.

But after years of wondering why some of us become the five-foot-something bread stuffed pudding packed into a human suit I stumbled upon an article where the author of Sprinkle Glitter on my grave, Jill Kargman accounts for a summer she discovers a chemical secret—all while attending a swamp-adjacent barbecue covered in a perfume she received as a gift from Aerin Lauder from the eponymous brand.

In her words – “I chucked it into a summer bag and happened upon it at my parents’ place by the beach. I did that thing you learn about in seventh grade—spritz grandly into the air and walk into the scent cloud. Completely enveloped, I went on my way to attend a swamp-adjacent barbecue.”

She recalls the place was teeming with skeeters, but by some miracle you get spared even a single chomp. Meanwhile every single other guest was slapping their body parts in a useless quest to quash those bloodsuckers. But why were you spared? Then it dawned: once at a hotel in Italy some kind staffer who felt my bug inflicted pain brought geranium-scented wipes. Aerin's perfume must smell like a straight-up sewage plant to those insects! Eureka!

The place was teeming with skeeters, but by some miracle you were spared even a single chomp. Meanwhile every single other guest was slapping their body parts in a useless quest to quash those bloodsuckers.

Yes it’s 43,213 times pricier than Off. But it probably smells great and doesn’t require you to baste yourself in noxious chemicals. Win win!

Now that she’s cracked this pest code she’s stoked at spreading the geranium-infused news. So pull on your shorts and have no fear— spritz easily and often so those winged assholes don't even think about making trouble. This was probably not what Aerin was going for when she came up with the fragrance, but hey, as with accidental discoveries like Viagra they are what we call— accidental.

Now it’s not Jill’s fault she’s mosquito bait, but we got a new my chemical romance downing here.

Nerd Talk

Here’s the actual science on why that geranium spritz turned you invisible to mosquitoes (instead of a walking buffet).

The star is rose geranium essential oil from Pelargonium graveolens (the plant behind Aerin Lauder’s Wild Geranium and those Italian hotel wipes). Its main heavy hitters are citronellol (≈30%) and geraniol (≈14–15%), plus a few other monoterpene alcohols.

Mosquitoes don’t just randomly bite—they hunt using their antennae receptors to sniff out your CO₂, lactic acid, body heat, and skin volatiles. These geranium compounds float into the air and bind directly to the mosquitoes’ odorant-binding proteins (OBPs), scrambling the signal like static on a bad radio station. To them, you suddenly smell like “sewage plant” or straight-up nothing edible.

Lab and field studies back it hard:

• Pure geraniol diffusers/candles repel 97% indoors and 75% outdoors.

• 10% geraniol lotions keep Aedes aegypti (the dengue/yellow-fever assholes) at bay for over an hour—top-tier performance among natural oils.

• Pelargonium oils have shown solid repellency against malaria vectors and other species in Africa and lab trials.

Nano-emulsions or higher concentrations make it last longer because the volatiles don’t evaporate as fast. It’s not DEET (that stuff lasts 6–8 hours), but it’s pretty decent for something that smells like fancy perfume instead of bug spray.

Pro tip: just planting the “citronella geranium” does almost nothing—you need the actual oil released into the air or on your skin. That’s why her cloud-walk trick worked: you turned yourself into a moving geraniol fog machine.

So yeah, science says those winged assholes really do think your fancy fragrance smells like garbage. Spritz on, stay unbitten. Hooray!

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Standard Therapeutics is an integrative medicine and functional health platform helping our users stay informed on the recent developments in the world of alternative medicine. We also help our users address their health concerns.

Image credits: Alamy